Spondylus

During this immersive learning experience, we went to what is now my favorite museum, Museo Larco, where we learned about this special shell that the ancient Peruvians used. It is called a Spondylus and is a beautiful, thorny, red shell. The Spondylus is a warm-weather mollusk that inhabits tropical waters. It was used to indicate changes in the environment such as El Nino. El Nino is when warm water oscillates into areas that are typically cooler. It brings heavy rains that can contribute to coastal flooding and erosion which posed problems for fishing and farming societies that lived there. When the Spondylus was seen, these societies were able to know early that El Nino was coming and they prepared so they could continue to have resources until the weather returned to normal. This mollusk was so important, that it held more value than gold or silver. Today, the mollusk is still important to the Peruvian economy, but in a different way. Instead of being used to predict weather and preserve crops, it is now commonly used to make beautiful jewelry.